Sirens

by Janet Fox

  We left the store with a bag of cosmetics, and Melody dropped me back at the apartment in the midafternoon before she went off on some private errand.

  So silent and so white, this space. I thought again about my home, my room with its flowered wallpaper, my chenille bedspread, Pops’s creaky old chair, Ma’s rhubarb pie, the landscapes cut from magazines and hung in Pops’s homemade frames, Grandpa Joe and Grandma Ellie in their finery in the round portrait over the fireplace. There was nothing homey here, nothing but still, clean newness. And me, plunked down in the middle of it, already a changeling, and wondering what was to happen next.

  I buried my queasiness in a cup of tea and a plate of fresh biscuits smothered in butter and made by my aunt’s capable cook.

  But I didn’t linger indoors for long, and decided not to wait until Melody returned. The day was warm like a promise, and New York beckoned. Teddy and I had walked the streets together enough that I knew where I was and felt at home. In the late afternoon I ventured out, my new shoes surprisingly comfortable.

  I made my way back down to Herald Square to Macy’s again. This time I paused to survey the fashions arrayed behind the glass windows. The mannequins gestured at each other accusingly, their pouty lips shiny with brilliant carmine, the long strands of pearls draping their necks iridescent in the glaring hot window lights. I wandered back to Fifth Avenue and headed uptown, passing the library, where I waved to the lions like a kid, the way I had when Teddy had brought me there so many years before. Autos rumbled down the avenue; horse-drawn carters hauled empty, clattering milk bottles for cleaning; boys, their voices singsong and unintelligible, hawked the evening papers.

  I walked west across Forty-fourth. The setting sun washed down the street, and I lifted my hand to my forehead and squinted against the glare. As I passed a set of heavy doors, they burst open and a group of men and women tumbled onto the sidewalk, all laughing and chattering, surrounding me in such a swell of enthusiasm and banter that I froze.

  “Oh, pardon me!” The man who’d almost trod on my shiny new toes lifted his hat in apology. The book tucked in the crook of his arm tumbled toward me, and I caught it; as I handed it back to him I saw the cover: Fanny, Herself.

  “I’ve read that,” I blurted.

  He paused. “Really? You mean it? You’ve read it?”

  “Yes, of course.” The warmth crept into my cheeks. It had been a favorite with Moira and me when we’d discovered it in the library. The heroine, Fanny, was a girl with a gift for drawing—why, I spent many nights rereading passages, savoring her search for freedom and success and imagining myself in her shoes, but with a pen substituting for a paintbrush.

  He looked me up and down. “So did you like it?”

  “I…yes, I did.”

  He turned to his companions. “Hey, Ed, listen to this. This lovely young thing has read your book.”

  The woman behind him said, “Really? One of the few,” and she laughed as she was tugged on up the street.

  “She liked it, Ed!” he called. He shrugged. “Oh well, they’re off. So, then, must I be, darling.” He tipped his hat to me and made a little bow. “Cheers!”

  And they were gone, leaving me in their wake.

  The doorman stood a few feet away, his hands behind his back. “You know who you were just talking to, don’t you?”

  I shook my head.

  “That was the membership of the Round Table.”

  “The Algonquin Round Table? Oh, my stars!” I gaped up at the awning. The Algonquin Hotel. Of course. Everyone knew about the Round Table at the Algonquin, set up in the back of the dining room. Since shortly after the war it had become the gathering place of New York literary types. Playwrights, novelists, journalists—they came together to talk about books, politics, and art. Early on the management had encouraged them, given them a reserved table, no doubt eyeballing a grand publicity ploy as well as the steady luncheon check.

  “I know them all by now.” The doorman wagged his finger. “I bet you don’t know who that was. The lady that Mr. Connelly spoke to.”

  Then I realized. “That wasn’t…”

  He nodded, looking mighty pleased. “Edna Ferber. Author of that book you had in your hands.”

  “She’s one of my heroes.” I gazed up the street in the direction they’d gone; the party had disbursed.

  “They’re here every day, though the members aren’t always the same. You might see her next time, or maybe Dorothy Parker. And Mr. Connelly, he’s a playwright. I know them all, yes, indeed.” He leaned over me. “I’m writing my own book, see. I plan to make it as a big-time writer, one of these days.” He moved away to mind the door.

  I looked up again at the awning, at the elaborately lettered name. New York was the city of all possibilities, of dreams come true. Even a doorman knew that.

  Whatever I was doing in this town, maybe my dreams didn’t have to die. Maybe they could just change, with luck.

  I pictured myself, a little journal in one hand and a pencil in the other, my cloche pulled low over my face, at a table just within earshot of these heroes of mine. I’d be taking notes. And then writing my own stories. Or I’d be a well-heeled editor in a smart suit working in one of the grand publishing houses. Or a librarian or teacher, writing in my spare hours from a cozy garret on the Upper East Side. A job, my own job. My own life.

  Girls like me, we had possibilities now, in this new decade of the twenties. We had the vote. We had our freedom…just look at Melody. My future was not so grim. New York City was the land of dreams.

  I touched the tips of my hair that peeked from under my cloche, tossed my head a little. I hadn’t realized how much those long locks had weighed me down. I was a modern girl now, living in the city that never sleeps, living in the decade of dreams….

  “Hey, watch it, babycakes! You’re interrupting the flow of traffic!” A woman coming out the door of the Algonquin barged straight into me, standing as I was in the middle of the sidewalk and looking up at the canvas awning, my moony eyes still fixed on my imaginary future.

  “Miss Louise!” The doorman greeted the woman with a hearty bark. “How’s the boy?”

  “Oh, he’s coming along, thanks, Pete. Didn’t drop any trays today, anyhow.” She had a husky voice, rough like sandpaper, gritty with cigarettes and experience. She turned to look straight at me. She was pretty, maybe about Melody’s age, with large, dark round eyes and hair curly and thick and red-tinted auburn, wearing a silky blue dress with a dropped waist and a hat with blue velvet trim. “Well? You alive? I didn’t trample you, did I? You’re standing there looking like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “Ma’am.”

  “Oh, doll, don’t give me ‘ma’am.’ Good grief. Makes me feel way too old.” She looked at me hard, but friendly. “Name’s Louise O’Keefe.” She leaned toward me. “But my friends call me Louie.” She shrugged. “Or Lou.”

  “Hi.” I extended my hand, growing bold. “It wasn’t a ghost I was looking at. It was my future.”

  She threw her head back and laughed, and it was a joyous thing to behold, her laugh. “Future? Well, careful now. The difference between seeing your future and seeing a ghost is just a matter of time.” She smiled as she shook my hand with a firm grip. Her smile and that laugh were so infectious I had to smile right back.

  I liked her. Her eyes had a spark, a kind of fire, even when her face was unreadable. “Are you a writer?”

  “Me?” Her round eyes grew rounder. “Heavens to betsy, no. I can barely hold a pencil.” She thumbed back toward the Algonquin’s dark interior. “But that’s why you’re here, huh? Stargazing.”

  “Stumbling, really,” I said, feeling sheepish. “Or being stumbled into.”

  “Gotta start somewhere.” She looked up at the awning. “I guess this is as good a place as any. Well, I gotta run, kiddo. Great to meet you, um…”

  “Jo.”

  “Great to meet you, Jo. Maybe we’ll run into each other agai
n. This city only looks big. In reality, it’s just another small town on a tiny little island.” And she gave another laugh, and tripped off, only to slip into the back of a shiny limousine up the block, the door held open for her by a gray-uniformed chauffer.

  My mouth dropped open, and I turned to Pete. “Is she famous?”

  He shrugged. “She’s connected.” He turned away, calling for a taxi for another client emerging from the hotel.

  I slipped behind him and through the great glass-and-brass doors and into the dark lobby, feeling like the commoner stealing into the magic castle.

  Inside, the wood and thick carpeting gave the place a hush, and massive furniture, clustered in arrangements for quiet conversation, hulked. Enormous square pillars supported a coffered ceiling. Even though the lobby bustled with activity, it was more like a library than a hotel, as the patrons in their rich attire moved in stately parade, sharing whispered confidences, knowing looks.

  I moved toward the restaurant, the entry guarded by a podium manned by a stiff employee who surveyed me over his half-glasses.

  “Help you, miss?”

  “I’m just looking, thanks.”

  He rolled his eyes and turned away, studiously ignoring me.

  I could see into the restaurant but had no idea where the Round Table might be, especially now that it was empty.

  But I saw a boy. The best-looking boy I’d ever seen.

  He stole my mind right away from Round Tables and stars and ghosts and swirling New York. I was a commoner, the beggar girl, inside the magic castle, and I was spying on a dark-haired prince.

  Except that he was a prince in disguise. He was a waiter, clearing up, moving among tables and chairs, his white shirtsleeves rolled up above his elbows, his black half apron double-tied over dark slacks. His thick black hair curled over his forehead, and he had a powerful build with an aquiline nose and eyes black as night. Even working hard as he was he fit right into that hushed and magical place, with his quick-sure animal movements and dark, dark eyes.

  I was a girl who’d given little thought to boys, except the unobtainable romantic heroes of my books. Now I felt as if one of those figures had sprung to life right here—and that was a first for me. Josephine Winter, the practical girl with the honest dreams, turning into a silly stargazer. Had I lost my common sense when I lost my hair?

  At this moment I didn’t care. He was what I’d dreamed about, a young Mr. Darcy, all dark eyes and smoky intensity. A drumming beat picked up in my chest.

  Echoed by the drumming of someone’s fingers on wood. “Miss?” Mr. Podium—Jacques, from the name on his badge—looked tired. “Would you like a table?”

  “Um, no. No, thanks.”

  “Then will you kindly step out of the way?”

  That was when I heard the couple murmuring, impatient, behind me, and I scuttled sideways, casting my eyes down and pulling my cloche over my forehead. And this gesture may have saved me.

  For in a corner of the grand lobby where I hadn’t seen him earlier, engaged in conversation with a group of men who seemed to attend to his every word, sat Daniel Connor in a thronelike chair, his boxer’s hands folded over his middle, his hair slicked back, his piercing stone-gray eyes flitting from the group he was with to the lobby at large, searching, reminding me of a cat, those narrowed eyes ever aware, ever watchful. He oozed power. I didn’t think he’d seen me, what with my new look and close-drawn cloche.

  I ducked lower and slipped behind one of the square pillars, my heart now beating a loud thumping percussion.

  What was it about Daniel Connor that made my throat burn? He wasn’t the dark prince; he was more like the prince of dark forces. He frightened me in a way I couldn’t explain, made me weak in the knees. It was as if he knew some secret about me.

  He was dangerous.

  I heard one of the men in his circle laugh, and peeked, and saw Connor leaning forward now, his head down; I took my chance to escape through the glass doors into the brilliant sunlight of the May afternoon. I walked as fast as I could up the street toward Park Avenue and the safety of my uncle’s apartment, my mind a whirl.

  So many new things had come in such a rapid clip. From my physical transformation to stumbling into my personal heroes to seeing a boy who seemed to have stepped right out of a romantic novel to nearly running into the very man my pops wanted to keep me away from…In only a few hours New York City already seemed a place where magic is real and where dreams—or nightmares—come true.

  I wanted all my dreams to come true. And my nightmares? I wanted them gone.

  CHAPTER 9

  Lou

  I met her—Jo—not too many days after she landed on the island of Manhattan. She seemed like such a kid compared to me. And for some reason the thought came to me, right off. Gosh. I’d met Danny when I was her age. Could it have been that long ago? And I’m not even that old, honey. Not that much older than Jo.

  Here’s the thing. I saw right off that she could become the next Louise O’Keefe. Pretty as all get-out, and I could tell she was smarter than me. But more important, she had that look. She wanted things. Not the usual things, maybe she wanted things I don’t care about, but does that matter in the end? It’s the wanting that matters.

  It was one of those two goons who said it first. Way back when it all started with Danny and me, back when I was Jo’s age, back when I had those same stars in my eyes. I wasn’t supposed to overhear them, and I dunno if Danny ever did hear them, ’cause if he had, he wouldn’t have been happy about it.

  But it was what he said, that Ryan or Neil or whichever. Talking to some guy who saw me sitting alone in the lobby of the Algonquin, waiting for Danny. They didn’t know I could hear them from behind that pillar.

  “Get a load of that! Some gams on that babe.” The guy gave a low whistle. “She a hoofer?”

  “Bank’s closed, buster. That’s Louise O’Keefe. She’s Danny’s moll. Touch her and you’ll end up at the bottom of the river.”

  “Too bad. His moll, huh? Too darn bad. Sings to me like a goshdarn siren. Too bad.”

  Me, Louise O’Keefe, that’s who they were talking about. I sat up a little straighter. No rough dishwater hands on me ever again, no; I was a siren. I was Danny Connor’s moll.

  I hadn’t heard the word before, since even growing up on the rough side of town, I was still kind of innocent, you know? Like Jo was when I met her.

  Back when I met Jo, that’s how it was. Me, a jealous moll. Jo, a sweet little kid who seemed to know right from wrong, who seemed to have it figured out, innocent or not. But the wanting, that’s where it comes from; it’s all about the wanting. When you want something bad enough, you’ll do anything to get it. Anything.

  Danny taught me that, along with just about everything else I know.

  CHAPTER 10

  MAY 21, 1925

  Zelda could do outlandish things—say anything. It was never offensive when Zelda did it, so you felt she couldn’t help it, and was not doing it for effect.

  —Lillian Gish, on meeting Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald in the 1920s

  Jo

  The shadows were long by the time I stepped out of the elevator and into that spare white foyer, lit now by the sleek deco table lamps. From the living room at the end of the hall I heard music, a gramophone playing Bessie Smith, sultry and slow. I slipped down the hall into my room.

  I combed my hair and put some of my new lipstick on my lips—and then wiped it off again as best I could after I looked at myself in the mirror and saw that glaring crimson—Killer Red, it was called—and made to head for the living room. As I turned into the hall, I ran smack into my aunt, who was emerging from her own rooms.

  “There you are!” Aunt Mary wrapped me in a hug, then launched into a mile-a-minute monologue. “I’m sorry I was out last night, couldn’t be here to greet you. The museum fund-raiser, you know—far too important to miss—we’re trying to purchase the Monet….”

  A pair of sisters couldn’t be more
different. Aunt Mary was small boned and blond, with a chirpy laugh and a ready smile. No wonder Uncle Bert had been so taken with her. My ma, on the other hand, was tall, thin, solemn, and dark haired—or had been dark haired before the gray had brushed it with ever-widening streaks over the past few years. And if my aunt wasn’t hip to the latest styles—her skirt was on the long side—she made a glamorous statement in black silk and a single long strand of pearls, and her hair fell over her ears in softly marceled waves.

  “Hi, Auntie. Ma said to send her love.”

  “Oh, sweetie, I’m just so happy you’re with us. Let’s go find your uncle.” She tucked her arm through mine and walked me into the living room. “Bert? She’s here.”

  The living room seemed to hold a crowd, suddenly silent, as Bessie and the gramophone stalled to a scratch, hiss, scratch, and all eyes turned toward me.

  In addition to cousin Chester, who lolled on the love seat with a smile that looked predatory, there were two men in the room: my uncle, Bertram Cates, round and red-faced and wearing a three-piece suit with a watch chain stretched across his ample middle; and a tall man with a beaked nose, his elbow resting against the mantel, leaning back so that the light of the room lit his face in profile but hid his eyes, the single thread of smoke from his cigarette spiraling into the air.

  Chester rose and moved to the phonograph and lifted the scratching needle from the recording.

  “Ah!” Uncle Bert beamed. “Josephine. So happy you’re here. I’d like to introduce a business acquaintance and good family friend. John Rushton, this is my niece, Josephine.”

  The man, Rushton, crushed his cigarette as he stepped forward and extended his hand. “Miss Winter.” I guessed him to be in his late twenties. His eyes revealed nothing; he didn’t release my hand for some seconds, so that I had to pull away from him. There was a gloom about him, a sadness tinged with desperation. He was an uneasy presence.